Genome-Wide Analysis of Glycoside Hydrolase Family 35 Genes and Their Potential Roles in Cell Wall Development in .

Plant β-galactosidases (BGAL) function in various cell wall biogeneses and modifications, and they belong to the glycoside hydrolase family. However, the roles of BGAL family members in cell wall remodeling remain unclear. In this study, a total of 25 members of the glycoside hydrolase gene family 35 were identified, and they were clustered into nine sub-families. Many cis-acting elements possibly related to MeJA and abscisic acid responses were identified in the promoter region of the genes. Transcript analyses showed that these genes exhibited distinct expression patterns in various tissues and developing stem internodes. Furthermore, a stem-specific expression module associated with cell wall metabolic pathways was identified by weighted correlation network analysis (WGCNA). In particular, and within the stem-specific expression module were highly expressed in mature stems. In addition, several genes involved in lignin, cellulose, hemicellulose and pectin pathways were co-expressed with and . It was also found that and were localized to the cell wall at the subcellular level, indicating their roles in the modification of cell wall metabolites in . As a whole, these results will be useful for further functional characterization and utilization of genes in cell wall modifications aiming to improve the quality of legume forage crops.